Through a collection of video and written classroom artifacts, this webcase shows how
Jocelyn creates a beit midrash (an environment for studying texts in havruta) in her
classroom and begins to teach her students havruta practices and skills–skills that help
students have productive conversations over texts and work together more effectively in
the classroom. The webcase presents excerpts from one full lesson at the end of the year,
demonstrating how working on havruta skills and studying Jewish texts about community
inform students' ideas about and actions in their own classroom community. It also
features excerpts from an interview with Jocelyn.

Webcases are a type of website that make aspects of classroom teaching and learning
available for investigation and discussion. They are not intended to present a full
curriculum, but to highlight particular aspects of a teacher's practice and create
opportunities for reflection on big questions about teaching and learning. This webcase
highlights the idea that integrating Jewish values into a classroom is not a one-
dimensional endeavor, but something that a teacher cultivates through her lessons, her
classroom environment, the skills and content she teaches her students, the activities in
which she engages students, and how she conducts discussions about challenging
classroom issues.

It provides images of and ideas about how a teacher can teach elementary school students
to successfully engage in meaningful text work in havruta, and the ways in which havruta
skills and practices such as active listening can complement concepts in the texts
themselves related to creating a strong and caring community. Most importantly, this
webcase makes visible the complex work of creating a classroom regularly engaged in
rich conversation about important content that can infuse students’ lives on multiple
levels.

The students in this webcase are third-graders in a K-8 community Jewish day school
with approximately 150 students. The community is made up of individuals from diverse
Jewish backgrounds with a range of learning strengths. Teachers are encouraged to
integrate subjects and make authentic connections between Jewish and general studies,
but general studies and Judaic studies (including daily Hebrew classes) are typically
taught by different teachers.

There is still a great deal to learn about how to teach core havruta practices and skills to
students of different ages and engage them in the work of text study. What becomes clear
through Jocelyn's case is that when a teacher intentionally teaches young students the
social and intellectual skills necessary for engaging in meaningful paired text work,
students can do so with success and great enthusiasm, and their havruta work can in turn
help them develop wider norms and practices for talking and interacting with one another
in their classroom community.